In the class 3A area 1 tournament championship game Saturday in Brewton, the T.R. Miller Lady Tigers got off to a slow start against Clarke County but claimed the championship with 41-16 win.
After trailing early 2-0, the Lady Tigers failed to score for the first 4:14 of the game.
From there, the Lady Tigers would use their signature defense to key a 7-0 run in the first quarter and an 11-0 run later in the game to get the 25-point win.
“It is always a great to win and today was a great win,” T.R. Miller Lady Tiger head coach Ron Jackson said. “The Lady Tigers played defense and usually when we do a great job of playing defense, we will have some success in the game and win. Anytime we can hold a team under 20 points, we have a great shot at winning. It is always tough in the playoffs as teams rest up and play hard, but we stepped our game up tonight. We have to get some people to put some more points up. Clarke County played some good defense on us late, but we need get some players to get some more baskets. They trapped us pretty well tonight. A lot of our plays run through the corners and they trapped us but we will work on that. It is always great to be a champion though.”
After tying the game at 2-2 with 3:46 left in the first quarter, T.R. Miller used a 7-0 run to claim a 7-2 lead with 1:41 left in the quarter to lead 9-4 after the first quarter of play.
With the two points to end the first quarter, T.R. Miller started the second quarter off on a 9-0 run to increase their run to an 11-0 run and lead to an 18-4 lead with 3:21 left before the half.
T.R. Miller would fail to score the remainder of the quarter but outscored Clarke County 9-2 to claim an 18-6 lead at the half.
In the third, T.R. Miller built leads of 21-6, 26-8, and 31-10 as they outscored the Lady Bulldogs 13-6 to take a 31-12 lead into the fourth.
In the fourth, Clarke County would cut the lead to 35-16 with 2:31 left to play, but the Lady Tigers ended the game on a 6-0 run and outscored Clarke County 10-4 in the fourth to get the win and championship.
The Lady Tigers were 3-for-6 from the free throw line in the win while Clarke County was 0-for-8.
T.R. Miller was led by Leah Brundidge with 14 points and Sha Kiser having nine points.
Courtney Jones had seven points and Brittany Rush had six points. Adrian Gibbs added five points in the win for the Lady Tigers.
All scorers are the starting five players for the Lady Tigers and they earned all-tournament team honors for the tournament.
In T.R. Miller’s two tournament games, they allowed a total of 24 points for an average of 12 while scoring 85 for an average of 42.
The win improved the Lady Tigers to 20-5 overall.
T.R. Miller will now play at home Thursday in the sub-regional round of the playoffs Thursday at 7 p.m. against area 4 runner-up Trinity.
With a win Thursday, T.R. Miller will advance to the South Regional in Mobile at the University of South Alabama.
The Lady Tigers would play the winner of the Slocomb (area 3 runner-up) at Geneva (area 2 winner) game at 6 p.m. Monday. Other teams playing are Clarke County (area 1 runner-up) at Montgomery Academy (area 4 winner) and Opp (area 2 runner-up) at Abbeville (area 3 winner).
The regional championship game will be Friday, Feb. 25, at 3 p.m. in Mobile with the winning team advancing to the Final Four in Birmingham.